Molinism, Predestination, Free Will, Grace?!

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AyJSimon said:
Okay, well you can disabuse yourself of that implication. It’s not what I meant.
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So, how can you deny free will then? Independent of how a particular set of circumstance came about, you are still free to choose from multiple options to proceed from where you are to some new place. By place I do not imply only a physical space.
 
davidv said:
So, how can you deny free will then? Independent of how a particular set of circumstance came about, you are still free to choose from multiple options to proceed from where you are to some new place. By place I do not imply only a physical space.
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Because to have options and to choose among them does not, in itself, prove free will. If you chose vanilla ice cream because it tasted better than chocolate, did you choose that antecedent cause? If you choose between 3 cars because one is green and that’s your favorite color, did you ever choose (rather than simply once recognize) that green is your favorite color?
 
AyJSimon said:
Because to have options and to choose among them does not, in itself, prove free will. If you chose vanilla ice cream because it tasted better than chocolate, did you choose that antecedent cause? If you choose between 3 cars because one is green and that’s your favorite color, did you ever choose (rather than simply once recognize) that green is your favorite color?
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Frankly, I don’t understand how any of these examples undermine free will. My favorite color is blue. My first car was black, my second one was green and my third one was red. A clear example that the choice was not based on one particular preference. How is my unchosen preference of significance? It is simply one of many of the circumstance that one considers in making a choice.
 
davidv said:
Frankly, I don’t understand how any of these examples undermine free will. My favorite color is blue. My first car was black, my second one was green and my third one was red. A clear example that the choice was not based on one particular preference. How is my unchosen preference of significance?
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I’m suggesting hypotheticals to simplify and clarify my position. I get that your actual choices played out differently - but this doesn’t invalidate the hypothetical. You simply have to put yourself in this imaginary person’s shoes for second.

But I’m even willing to play it your way. Why do you think you chose a black car for your first car?
 
AyJSimon said:
I’m suggesting hypotheticals to simplify and clarify my position. I get that your actual choices played out differently - but this doesn’t invalidate the hypothetical. You simply have to put yourself in this imaginary person’s shoes for second.

But I’m even willing to play it your way. Why do you think you chose a black car for your first car?
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The key attribute for my first car was price. What I could afford did not to have satisfy my color preference.

So back to your hypothetical. Just because your choice happens to coincide with your preference does not indicate the your preference forced the choice, as my real life example demonstrates.
 
davidv said:
The key attribute for my first car was price. What I could afford did not to have satisfy my color preference.

So back to your hypothetical. Just because your choice happens to coincide with your preference does not indicate the your preference forced the choice, as my real life example demonstrates.
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Nothing about my hypothetical was meant to show that any one particular preference always forces a choice in line with that preference. That’s why it was a hypothetical.

But back to your real life example - why did you make price your key attribute in selecting the black car?
 
AyJSimon said:
Nothing about my hypothetical was meant to show that any one particular preference always forces a choice in line with that preference. That’s why it was a hypothetical.

But back to your real life example - why did you make price your key attribute in selecting the black car?
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Necessity. I was 18 and had only a few resources.
 
davidv said:
No. Why does that matter?

These may have limited my choices, but it did not eliminate them.
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Your options don’t need to be eliminated, but if you didn’t choose the circumstances which proved causal in buying the car you bought, how did you choose to buy it of your own free will?
 
AyJSimon said:
Your options don’t need to be eliminated, but if you didn’t choose the circumstances which proved causal in buying the car you bought, how did you choose to buy it of your own free will?
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How does the choice cause my choice?

My will causes my choice. If the question is, why did I choose. The answer is, I willed it. If in the car buying example, the choice was to not buy, how could any of the choices cause that decision.
 
AyJSimon said:
Because to have options and to choose among them does not, in itself, prove free will. If you chose vanilla ice cream because it tasted better than chocolate, did you choose that antecedent cause? If you choose between 3 cars because one is green and that’s your favorite color, did you ever choose (rather than simply once recognize) that green is your favorite color?
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If an ISIS member can refrain from beheading his captive, would he have free will? Or does he simply, absolutely, have to do such a thing, like some kind of blind single-minded animal-no choice? Can he change his mind? Is he without will, for all practical purposes?
 
Richca said:
God created human beings in his own image and likeness. If God did not create any beings with a spiritual soul of intellect and free will after His own image, then there would be no creatures who could share in His beatitude for eternity. This is what God offers mankind, eternal life and happiness and a share in God’s beatitude for all eternity. Would you rather not be offered this but rather be as a lifeless rock? God knew by creating intelligent creatures with free will he was taking somewhat of a gamble as it were, some would reject their creator and would rather live in eternal misery and unhappiness. However, many would know, love and serve their creator and choose life and happiness and be blessed with eternal beatitude. I, for one, am very happy that I have a chance to live eternally with God and live happily forever.

The evil we see and experience in the world is not God’s doing but man’s. Yet, even from our evil doings, God draws good out of it and so we sing “O happy fault, that earned for us so great, so glorious a redeemer.” Your view of the world and of God, apparently, is certainly not ours.
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First, I respect your faith…which, as you well know, is what it is. Second, everything beyond that deifies logic, which, I think, should be the goal of any philosophy forum.Third, I obviously no longer believe in the same gas as you.
I cannot serve any deity, or person for that matter, who gives me no true choice.

Evil is a result of mankind…has and never did have anything to do with the deity…since that deity had no direct involvement with our lives, IMHO.
 
fhansen said:
If an ISIS member can refrain from beheading his captive, would he have free will? Or does he simply, absolutely, have to do such a thing, like some kind of blind single-minded animal-no choice? Can he change his mind? Is he without will, for all practical purposes?
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No, the ISIS member cannot change his mind. His mind can only, potentially, be changed by other factors, internal and external, none of which are chosen by him in the first place. But there is no inner Self, operating within the clockwork to theoretically override what the mind is determined to do.
 
fhansen said:
If an ISIS member can refrain from beheading his captive, would he have free will? Or does he simply, absolutely, have to do such a thing, like some kind of blind single-minded animal-no choice? Can he change his mind? Is he without will, for all practical purposes?
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If we are merely biological computers there is no reason to believe any of our conclusions are correct! I wasn’t aware that machines are capable of insight… 😉
 
tonyrey said:
If we are merely biological computers there is no reason to believe any of our conclusions are correct! I wasn’t aware that machines are capable of insight… 😉
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Yes, this is also Plantinga’s argument referred to as EAAN: en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Evolutionary_argument_against_naturalism

This argument is certainly interesting, and I agree to some extent that, given total naturalism and evolution driven by natural selection, we have good reason to be suspicious of the truth value of all of our beliefs. Then again, I would say we have many good reasons to suspect our beliefs anyway, but I suppose it is just one more.

It isn’t so much that God requires us to choose any particular thing, but that he creates us, everything else, and the conditions in which we make choices. Our own narratives can’t just go anywhere. The plot of our lives has been constructed by the author with a very specific end in mind.

Has anyone ever read one of those books where you can choose to flip to different parts of the book to “control” the narrative? Like: “if you tell Molly “no way!” then turn to page 87, but if you tell Molly “of course!” then turn to page 19…etc?”

Now imagine if the author of the book has always and will always know exactly which pages you will choose? Are you truly a co-author of this book? Or, are you merely a sort of passive participant? I’m not denying that we really do flip the pages and make decisions based on reasoning, but it does seem like we can’t be held “solely responsible” for the outcome of the story! It also makes no sense to say the author of the book can’t be blamed or praised for the final outcome of the plot.
 
AyJSimon said:
No, the ISIS member cannot change his mind. His mind can only, potentially, be changed by other factors, internal and external, none of which are chosen by him in the first place. But there is no inner Self, operating within the clockwork to theoretically override what the mind is determined to do.
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So he’s driven, like a machine. “What the mind is determined to do” cannot be overidden by a nobler, higher ideal, one that the self might weigh in consideration of its superior worth? He simply must behead, like some sort of automated guillotine? So It would be impossible for him to have a change of heart, to ask himself, perhaps, whether or not this is actually right?
 
AyJSimon said:
Your options don’t need to be eliminated, but if you didn’t choose the circumstances which proved causal in buying the car you bought, how did you choose to buy it of your own free will?
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One of the circumstances is our free decision. Sometimes we make irrational decisions that don’t make sense based on the circumstances. Why do we do this?
 
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